Manel Lacambra, team Sports Director, described the tactics for the race, "Today's race was another hard one where we knew we had to deal with a lot of mountains. We decided to control the race for the first 45 km after which the first climbs started.

"We put the team in front setting a fast tempo. When we got to the top of the mountain, there was a group left of 15 riders including Kristin Armstrong, Claudia Häusler and Emma Pooley.

"We then had to deal with a lot of attacks during the last flat portion of the race but no one was able to break free. The other teams saw that today we were really strong and didn't want to help us at all.

"We tried to control all the final attacks but it was impossible with eventually two riders being able to escape. We tried to close down the escape but nobody would help us.

"Kristin Armstrong and Claudia Häusler were the only riders able to stay at the front with Claudia providing very good lead out for Kristin, but in the end Kristin was unable to keep the pace of the leaders for the uphill finish and finished in the top 10."